Rolling up that Hill #5: The Valley of Rocks
We visited Devon on our little annual trip and every year it is remarkable. Being in a form that changes very dramatically one year to the next, from boy to girl, from able to disabled, from walking to wheelchair, and visiting a place annually that never changes, really emphasises your own shapeshifting.
On one evening as the sun began to set I declared relatively suddenly my intent to go and watch the sunset from the beach. My partner, The Rogue, ever kind, wondered whether we hadn’t left it too late to get there in time, but now me and my wheelchair, the Rocinante, can move faster and farther than my legs ever could. So The Rogue and I adventured out into the evening air, rolled a mile to the beach, and sat on a bench watching the extraordinary colours of the evening sky fade into darkness.
The sunset over low tide at a beach in Croyde
Buoyed by our little excursion I decided that on this trip we would try to complete another Rolling up that Hill adventure, this time on the cliffs of Devon with no barrier between us and the sea, as we traversed The Valley of Rocks.
This route pushes 5 miles in a circle, ascending 320 metres up along the edge of the cliffs on a tarmacked undulating path that the website suggests ‘is not recommended for wheelchairs’ but we’ve never let little things like ‘not recommended’, or ‘unsafe’, or ‘difficult to reach by ambulance’ stop us before. The route then ascends the steepest hill imaginable into Lynton, and features a slow roadside cruise all the way back to the car.
Usually on a trip like this, that defensive, vigilant part of me would draw her sword and we’d approach this challenge pretty fearlessly. But somehow she was nowhere to be seen. So instead I wholesale panicked pretty much the entire cliffside route. The truly scary challenge was getting out of the chair to push it from behind. Some of the hills were steep enough that pushing from aboard the Roci would risk tipping. The move to recover from a backwards tip is to release the wheels and allow the chair to roll backwards before using the momentum to turn to face downhill. But on a cliffside route both tipping and such a recovery move would risk a rather impressive fall to almost certain doom. If I managed not to tip, my shoulders would nonetheless risk injury as they worked 100kg steeply uphill.
So the only realistic option was to get out and push. But getting out of the Roci, stepping over the MKII flywheel, and moving around on unsteady legs is by no means a safe thing to attempt. Similarly, getting back into the Roci when the legs are tired risks them failing to lift sufficiently, and tripping. I looked it up and tripping on a cliffside route is considered ‘somewhat unwise’ so I took a great deal of care.
It is a strange thing to not be able to trust your body. Each step, every command to lift the leg, is suddenly a risk. Once habitual, even casual, now the leg doesn’t always rise at all, and if it does it doesn’t always rise as far as you have instructed. When you’re aiming to clear an obstacle this can easily lead to trouble.
I have experienced a few dramatic falls, but the first big one occurred after I had been on my feet for a few hours at an escape room, and I was trekking back to my car across a car park. Rather than stay on the level tarmac, I decided almost without thinking to step up a curb to a short patch of pavement that cut the corner of the carpark. My leg didn’t lift far enough and caught the edge of the curb. I pulled the leg forward with haste to compensate, to catch myself, but the leg’s response was sluggish and when it landed it was too far back and propelled me forward rather than catching me. I catapulted myself across the tarmac.
So a cliffside walk where I need to step over my wheelchair’s front wheel is now a huge risk. I took my time, alternating between pushing the chair from on board and walking from behind.
I couldn’t find that part of myself that draws her sword in these moments, she really had absconded, and rather than ‘you’ve got this, I’m with you, take your time and act with care, you can do this’ all I heard was ‘aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!!’.
You may well be curious why someone didn’t push me from behind up the steeper hills. One of the interesting features of wheelchair use is that people see me aboard it and think it would be pretty easy to push from behind. I think it is hard to visualise the weight, but the Roci and I weigh a combined 100kg. This is the weight of a fridge. Imagine putting your fridge on wheels and pushing it uphill, that’s the level of difficulty. When I’m pushing it from behind it’s only 25kg or so, the weight of a mini-fridge, and even using legs with all the physical strength of low-flying cloud I can still manage to push this thing uphill. When I’m seated, I’m propelling a fridge uphill with my arms, which is why I’m so muscular now. Honestly, I’m stacked like a jenga tower, though I am at a similar risk of falling over.
Together we made it around the riskiest parts of the Valley of Rocks, back to safer climbs, and got all the way around back to the car. On the decline back I freewheeled downhill, bending around corners at speed all the way back to our vehicle waiting patiently in the summer sun.
So what did we learn on this mission now accomplished. Cliffside walks are abjectly terrifying, and rather dangerous, and maybe we can afford for the next climb to raise a couple fewer hairs. We learned that routes are much easier if I don’t need to get out and push, and that safe routes are easier even if I do need to get out and push periodically, but cliffside routes that steep are a fairly extreme level of difficulty. There were a good few moments when I considered turning back, but the undulating nature of the walk meant more steep climbs regardless of which direction I took, so I grit my teeth, held my breath, and got to work. This climb also reminds me, as they all do, what we are now capable of. I still can’t really believe the life that I now live, one that I clawed into being through sheer force of will, good humour, and a drive toward adventure and discovery, not just of new lands and new heights, but also of myself and what we become when fate’s dice hit the table.
So where next my companions? Well we need to make a second attempt at Pilot Hill. That thing is a beast. We nearly expired last time we tried only being rescued by carpenters, and this time I will go better prepared.
When the weather cools a little, Rolling up that Hill begins anew, we will see the summit of Pilot Hill.
Cora wheeling in the Rocinante on the cliffside of the Valley of Rocks